Human trafficking, as a serious violation of human rights and freedoms, is still present in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This was announced on Tuesday, as part of the final discussion on the occasion of the European Day against Human Trafficking.  

Samir Rizvo, from the BiH Security Ministry, said that human trafficking still poses a number of challenges for the entire society. A specific type of human trafficking is child trafficking, and cases in which competent BiH institutions come into contact with such cases are not rare. 

Michael Ahn, from the American Embassy in BiH, said that the annual Report on Human Trafficking ranks countries in four levels. BiH is on the second. According to this year's report, BiH authorities have made greater efforts in the fight than last year, but there is still much room for improvement. The weakness is that the authorities identified a smaller number of victims, among other things, due to the lack of resources, capacity and professional knowledge, in order to approach this problem adequately. 

A total of 57 victims of human trafficking were identified, less than in 2020. Of the total number, 54 were minors. Authorities did not investigate cases of potential forced child begging and forced labour involving Roma victims, but rather justified them as traditional cultural practices and customs and returned children to their families even when parents were involved in exploiting their children. 

The problem is that the laws do not recognize parents as persons who commit the criminal offence of human trafficking.